My Granddad Became My Only Guardian 15 Years Ago, Recently I Learned We’re Not Related – Story of the Day

A young boy proudly lives with his loving grandfather and believes the old man's stories about his dead parents. Until one day years later, the man comes clean. Will they ever recover from this revelation?

Do you remember that feeling when your school summer vacations were ending, and your parents had come to pick you up from your grandpa's house? That frown and sigh as you walked out of the house, wishing you could stay just a little longer?

Well, sorry, but I never had that feeling. I never had to leave my grandfather's beautiful house once the holidays were over because, as a child, I'd lived with him for as long as I could remember.

Yup, my childhood was one endless summer vacation filled with love, laughter, long walks, gardening, my grandfather's fantastical stories, him, and me.

We had a beautiful home down the street in a neighborhood where a lot of other kids and pets would run around and play. I was a happy toddler, and only once I started school did I realize that I could read and do math much better than most kids - thanks to my grandfather, who taught me to love learning.

He was my only guardian, and every essay and poem and boast that came out of young me was about him. I never felt the need to ask him about my parents until the backbenchers in my class started mocking me when I was about 12.

"Grandpa, I have to know! Tell me about my parents. Who were they, and what happened to them?" I remember waking him up once in the middle of the night to ask him.

"I lied to you, child. I've been lying to you all my life!" he said between bitter sobs.

That's when he told me that my mother was a beautiful singer and my father worked at the sugar factory on the outskirts of the town.

"I remember how your father would shriek with joy or pinch himself every time he remembered your mom was pregnant. 'I can't wait to be a dad to my champ!' he would say. And your mom? What can I say? The lullabies I sing to you, I heard from her. She would sing to you every time you were restless inside her tummy, and it would always calm you…"

He reluctantly revealed that my parents had died in an accident when I was only days old, and it was a miracle that I survived without a scratch on my body.

Grandpa's wide eyes teared up and dried several times that night as he recollected my young parents and told me little things about them. I could see how much he loved them.

But there was something he said that night that filled my heart with gratitude toward the man.

"People were asking me to give you up in a shelter. They didn't think a 45-year-old man could raise a baby. But I put my foot down and refused. I didn't give you up, and it's the best decision I've made in my entire life, child!"

I remember my tender heart melting when he said that. I remember how determined I was to become a big man, a great success, and make him proud. I wanted to do something special for him, something to show him how thankful I was for taking me in.

Until it finally occurred to me. Grandpa would always talk about this old car he had and how it had been with him through some of the most adventurous days of his life. He had to sell that car when he was still young, and he missed the thrill of sitting behind the wheel.

"That's it!" I thought. "I'm going to buy him a car!" It was like a mission to me, and I had it written on the back of all my notebooks back then.

Without my grandpa knowing, I started saving the lunch money he gave me and the cash he gifted me on birthdays, and every quarter I found dropped and forgotten on the streets.

Even after three years of all that saving up, I didn't have remotely enough to buy a car. I was disappointed, but on the bright side, I was 15! That meant I could earn some real money by helping people who didn't mind paying for errands and odd jobs.

I was quick on my feet and great with numbers, so I had no trouble getting paid by small shop owners for handling their billing work at the end of the day.

Years passed, and I got closer and closer to the goal amount. Of course, life got in the way sometimes, with a roof that needed repairs or a pipe that busted and had to be repaired. But I never scratched that dream off my mind.

I completed my education and started working as an accountant at a firm. It didn't pay very well, but that was the best job I could get while my peers were struggling to find one.

I worked hard, earned, saved, and kept thinking of my grandpa proudly driving a car. Until one day, I had done it!

That feeling of walking into the used cars shop and buying that sleek, slightly dented red car remains fresh in my memory even today.

I bought it for the perfect milestone in my grandpa's life. It was his 70th birthday! And believe me when I tell you that the moment he saw the car, he turned into a child who had just been given a toy car for his birthday.

He would've thanked me and hugged me a thousand times that day. And when he got into the car and settled behind the wheel, it was like a whole other side of him had been unlocked.

He was bursting with happiness, the wind in his silver hair, the wrinkles turning upwards around his bright eyes…I'm so glad I took a lot of pictures!

"Seeing you this happy makes me so happy! It's my childhood dream come true! A thank you gift for choosing to raise me after my parents died." I hugged him.

That's when I noticed his entire body droop and his voice crackle into an outburst of cries.

"What's wrong, grandpa?" I asked cluelessly.

"I lied to you, child. I've been lying to you all my life!" he said between bitter sobs.

"I'm not your grandfather!" he blurted and gave me a moment to take it in.

I didn't believe him at first, but he didn't stop talking until he had told me the whole story sincerely, without letting my hands go.

It turns out he wasn't my grandfather after all. He was just a neighbor who lived next door to my parents in the neighboring town. He lived alone in that house, and he saw my parents struggle to make ends meet even before my mom was pregnant.

"Your folks were poor but incredibly kind. We were there for each other, your parents and I. I took care of your mother when she was bedridden due to a rare illness so that your father could go to work. And when my bedroom was charred due to an accidental fire once, your parents shared their little home with me."

"All that stuff about them being over the moon when your mother got pregnant, the joy that it brought us, that was all true."

And that fateful accident that claimed my parents' lives was true, too, except for one detail. I wasn't a newborn when it happened. I was a three-year-old boy.

"When you were born, Patrick, oh! I can't even begin to explain what that was like for a nobody like me. I never told you this, but before I was your parents' neighbor, I had a wife and son. I had my own happy family. But when my boy was 15, fate snatched both him and his mother away from me. It was a fever… just a fever that wouldn't go away. They suffered, and I did my best to get help. But within weeks of each other, my wife and my son died. I lost everything."

"So years later, when you came along, I saw my son in you. I saw his curiosity, I saw his innocence, and I took every chance I got to look after you."

"And when your parents died, you were asleep in my arms, unaware of the world that had just shattered for you."

"Looking at that peace on your face, I couldn't bring myself to give you up. I did everything I could to become your official guardian. It was a long fight, but a year later, things worked out. And I've been your guardian, your grandfather, ever since."

I didn't know how to take this new truth about my past. I didn't speak to the man for the rest of the week and buried myself in old photos of my parents, looking at them in a new light.

And one moment, it finally hit me. The man was merely a neighbor. How kind must he have been to take on the responsibility of an orphaned child? How loving must he have been to see his son in me and raise me as his own?

And how grateful should I be towards the man to whom I owed everything?

It's been 15 years now, but I remember walking into his room, waking him up in the middle of the night again, and apologizing to him for the past week. I couldn't say much, and he let me cry while he sat with my pain.

"You ARE my grandfather. You are the closest person to me in the world. The angel who took me in. Thank you for everything, grandpa!" I cried and felt him whisper, "I love you, grandson," as his tears trickled onto my shirt.

What can we learn from this story?

• Family isn't always rooted in blood. Patrick's grandfather wasn't actually related to him, but he became the one who raised the boy single-handedly.
• Be kind to the journey of your elders. Our parents and grandparents have been through things we can never fully understand, so it's wise to be more accepting of their mistakes and misjudgments.

Share this story with your friends. It might brighten their day and inspire them.

If you enjoyed this story, you might like this one about another doting grandfather who takes care of his grandson through the most difficult phase of his childhood, until the child speaks at a custody hearing in court one day.

This piece is inspired by stories from the everyday lives of our readers and written by a professional writer. Any resemblance to actual names or locations is purely coincidental. All images are for illustration purposes only. Share your story with us; maybe it will change someone's life. If you would like to share your story, please send it to info@amomama.com.